108 Indian Forest Records . [Vol. VIII 
is our ultimate aim) we want, in a general way, to know three 
things. 
Firstly, the precise nature of each process in itself; secondly, the 
way in which it depends on or is related to the processes that precede 
or follow it; and thirdly, how each process is or can be modified 
to our desire by altering the circumstances under which it takes place. 
Further, as a means of enhancing nett outturn, it may be necessary to 
enquire into causes of loss at various points in the chain, and the means 
of checking it. 
In carrying out this chain of processes three chief agents are 
involved : plants, lac insects, and men. 
(1) Plants extract from the soil and air certain substances that 
are then worked up into the more elaborate forms of 
“protoplasm,” cellulose, starch, sugar, oil, tannins, 
etc., etc. 
(2) Lac insects suck up some of these products from plant 
and from them manufacture lac. 
(3) Men collect the lac, remove dirt and dye, and convert the 
resin and wax into shellac. The shellac may undergo 
some slight further manipulation to fit it for special 
purposes. 
Men also assist the lac insect by “ lac cultivation ” to find 
suitable and sufficient food in successive generations. 
It will be obvious that the central and crucial process is number 
(2), and one group of enquiries will be those concerned with the insect, 
with the way inwhich it makes its lac and the nature of the raw mate¬ 
rials it uses, with methods of increasing its output and checking loss 
from enemies or other causes. A second group will be those enquiries 
concerned with the plants that supply the insect with its food and raw 
materials particularly with regard to the conditions most favourable to 
their growth, the best practical methods of growing them for lac pro¬ 
duction, and the means of obtaining from them the greatest yield of 
raw material without undue detriment to their vitality. 
On the results of these two sections of enquiry almost all improve¬ 
ments in general methods of lac cultivation in the field will depend. 
We have, therefore, no good reason for any separate group of enquiries 
under the head of “ cultivation ” but we have still to deal with the 
highly important processes of “ manufacture ” which are certainly 
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